Terms of service

Version 2. Updated 16th October 2026.

1. Who we are and how to contact us

We are Tota, a trading name of The Metagenomic Testing Company Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 16729944. Our registered office and laboratory are at Units 5 & 7, 127 Olympic Avenue, Milton Park, Abingdon, OX14 4SA, United Kingdom.

You can reach us at hello@tota.bio, or write to us at the address above.

If we need to contact you, we will use the email address you gave us when you ordered. Where these terms use the words "writing" or "written", that includes email.

2. What Tota is, and what it is not

Tota is a wellness test that gives insights into your microbiome. It is not a diagnostic test and does not diagnose, screen for, treat, prevent or monitor any condition, and it does not replace medical advice. If you have symptoms or health concerns, please speak to a healthcare professional. Tota is not a substitute for testing arranged by a clinician.

We cannot offer medical advice and can only recommend that you seek medical help from a health care professional if your symptoms persist or concern you.

Your report tells you which micro-organisms we identified in your sample and in what quantity, together with general educational information about those organisms. We do not interpret your results for you, we do not tell you what they mean for your health, and we do not recommend treatment. Any decision about your health is one for you and a healthcare professional.

3. Who can buy from us

Our tests are for adults. You must be 18 or over to buy a test and to take a sample. You will be asked to confirm your age when you order.

You must be able to understand and follow the instructions in the kit and to give your own consent to the test. If you need support to do that, please contact us before you order. 

4. Your order and when a contract is made

Orders for testing kits are placed online.

Our acceptance of your order occurs when we email you an order confirmation, at which point a contract will come into existence between you and us. However, occasionally we may not be able to accept your order.

This might be because testing kits are out of stock, because of limits in our capacity to carry out analyses, or because we have identified an error in the price or description of the product. If this happens, we will inform you and issue a full refund.

5. Price and payment

The price of the product, including any applicable VAT, will be the price indicated on the order pages when you placed your order. We take all reasonable care to ensure that the price of the product advised to you is correct.

You can pay by the debit and credit cards and other payment methods shown at checkout. The price you see at checkout is the total price. It includes VAT, delivery of your kit to you, and return postage for your sample. Uk orders include postage and EU orders should pay delivery at checkout. We will not add any charge later that we have not told you about before you paid.

6. Sending your kit to you

We will try to send testing kits to you the same working day if ordered before 4pm, after which they will be sent the next working day.

Delivery to you and return postage for your sample are both included in the price. We use a tracked postal service.

Delivery times can be affected by things outside our control, and you should allow extra time for deliveries to and from the Scottish Highlands and Islands and other remote areas.

If your kit is delayed or lost in the post, tell us and we will send you a replacement at no charge. If your sample is delayed or lost on its way to us, tell us and we will send you a replacement kit at no charge. We are not responsible for losses beyond that which are caused by a carrier’s delay rather than by anything we have done, but nothing in this paragraph affects your legal rights.

We reserve the right to change the carrier and type of service used for sending kits and returning samples, provided the alternative is equivalent or better.

If no one is available at your address to take delivery and the products cannot be posted through your letterbox, you may need to rearrange delivery or collect the products from a local depot.

If you do not take delivery of the testing kit within a reasonable period of the first attempt to deliver it to you, it may be returned to us and you will be responsible for re-arranging delivery of the testing kit at your sole expense.

7. Taking your sample and sending it back

Accuracy of test results depends on proper use of testing kits.

You accept that it is your responsibility to comply with all instructions included within a testing kit.

If you fail to follow these instructions the test result might not be accurate. You must also provide a sufficient sample for testing in line with the instructions provided.

If your sample cannot be analysed, please see section 9. In most cases we will send you a replacement kit free of charge.

When returning samples to us you must follow packaging instructions supplied. If you do not, your sample may be delayed or may arrive in a condition we cannot analyse.

Your kit is valid for six months from the date we dispatch it. Please take and return your sample within that time. We cannot process samples taken with a kit older than six months. 

8. Your results

We aim to publish your results within five working days of your sample arriving at our laboratory. Most results are ready in two or three working days. These are estimates and not guarantees, and they are the times we aim for once your sample reaches us, not from the date you order.

We will email you when your results are ready. You view them by signing in to your Tota account on our website.

Your results stay available in your account for as long as your account is active. If your account is inactive for ten years we will delete it and your results, and we will email you before we do. You can download your results at any time, and we would encourage you to do so if you want to keep them permanently.

It is your responsibility to keep your account password secure and not to share it. Your results are personal to you.

9. If your sample cannot be analysed

Occasionally a sample cannot be analysed. It may have degraded in transit, or something may have gone wrong in our laboratory. If that happens we will tell you, and we will send you a replacement kit free of charge or, at your request, a refund. 

The one exception is where the sample could not be analysed because the kit instructions were clearly not followed. In that case we will explain what went wrong and you can buy a replacement kit which costs £20 or receive a refund less £20 and any delivery charge. If you disagree with our view, tell us and we will look at it again.

10. Your right to change your mind

Please see our Refund and Cancellation Policy for full details of your rights and our terms on returns, refunds, and replacements.

Nothing in these Terms affects your statutory rights, including your rights under the Consumer Rights Act 2015 and the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013.

11. Subscriptions

If you buy a subscription, our Subscription Policy applies in addition to these terms and forms part of them. It covers billing, price changes, reminders before payment and how to cancel.

12. Our website, your account and your report

You may use our website and your Tota account for your own personal purposes. You are not to interfere with the site, gain access to anyone else’s account or data, copy or scrape our content, or use the site in a way that is unlawful or that could damage it, us or other users.

You are responsible for keeping your sign-in details secure and for activity on your account. Tell us as soon as you can if you think someone else has access to it.

Your report and your results are yours. You can share them with anyone you like, including a healthcare professional. The design of our reports, our website content, our software and our analysis methods remain ours, and we ask that you do not reproduce them commercially or present our content as your own.

We may need to take the website or your account offline from time to time for maintenance. We will try to give notice where we can, and to keep it short.

13. Your personal information

Your test involves information about your health, which the law treats as needing extra protection. Our Privacy Policy explains what we collect, why, how long we keep it and what your rights are. We also ask for your specific consent to analyse your sample, separately from these terms, and you can withdraw that consent.

14. If something goes wrong

If you have any questions or complaints about a testing kit or the services we provide, please contact us.

You can write to us at: hello@tota.bio

We are under a legal duty to supply products that are in conformity with this contract.Nothing in these terms affects your rights under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, which cannot be excluded or limited.

15. Our responsibility to you

If we fail to comply with these terms, we are responsible for loss or damage you suffer that is a foreseeable result of our breaking this contract or our failing to use reasonable care and skill.

Loss or damage is foreseeable if either it is obvious that it will happen or if, at the time the contract was made, both we and you knew it might happen, for example, if you discussed it with us during the sales process.

We do not exclude or limit in any way our liability to you where it would be unlawful to do so. This includes liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence or the negligence of our employees, agents or subcontractors; for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation; for defective products under the Consumer Protection Act 1987; and for breach of the rights the Consumer Rights Act 2015 gives you in relation to goods and services.

Our tests are sold to you as a consumer, for your own personal use. We will not be liable to you for loss of profit, loss of business, business interruption or loss of business opportunity.

We will carry out your analysis with reasonable care and skill. Because our test is a laboratory test, and because we do not interpret results or advise on treatment, we are not responsible for decisions you or anyone else takes on the basis of your results, or for any loss that follows from such a decision. This does not limit our responsibility for carrying out the analysis itself with reasonable care and skill.

We shall not be responsible for any loss of access to your results to the extent that such an occurrence is outside of our reasonable control. 

Except for the matters listed above, our total liability to you in connection with any orders and/or interactions with us is limited to the greater of the price you paid for that order or £500. In the case of subscriptions, this shall be the greater of the price you paid for an individual test or £500. 

16. Changes and suspension

If you do not pay us for the services when you are supposed to we may suspend supply of the services until you have paid us the outstanding amounts.

We will contact you to tell you we are suspending supply of the services.

If you wish to make a change to the services you have ordered please contact us. We will let you know if the change is possible.

If it is possible we will let you know about any changes to the price of the services, the timing of supply or anything else which would be necessary as a result of your requested change and ask you to confirm whether you wish to go ahead with the change.

17. Delays outside our control

We are not responsible for delays outside our control.

If the provision of test results is delayed by an event outside our control then we will take reasonable steps to minimise the effect of the delay.

Provided we do this we will not be liable for any cost, expense or other loss or damage that you might suffer as a result of any delay caused by the event.

If there is a risk of substantial delay you may contact us to end the contract and receive a refund for any services you have paid for but not received.

Any dates given on our website, or in the order confirmation, are only an estimate of when your testing kit will arrive or when your test results could be received.

18. Ending the contract because of something we have done

If you are ending a contract for a reason set out below, the contract will end immediately, and we will refund you in full for any services which have not been provided. Valid reasons are:

• We have told you about an error in the price or description of the services you have ordered and you do not wish to proceed.

• There is a risk that supply of the services may be significantly delayed because of events outside our control.

• We have suspended supply of the services for technical reasons, or notify you we are going to suspend them for technical reasons, in each case for a period of more than one month.

• You have a legal right to end the contract because of something we have done wrong.

19. Other important terms

When you order, we may ask you some questions about yourself. We show your answers alongside your results so you have them in one place.

It is your responsibility to ensure that you provide the correct information. If you do not provide the correct information, this could mean that the result of the test is not accurate.

We may transfer our rights and obligations under these terms to another organisation. We will always tell you in writing if this happens and we will ensure that the transfer will not affect your rights under the contract.

We carry out all sequencing and analysis ourselves, in our own laboratory in Oxfordshire. We use other companies for things like payment processing, delivery and email. 

This contract is between you and us. No other person shall have any rights to enforce any of its terms. Neither of us will need to get the agreement of any other person in order to end the contract or make any changes to these terms. Each of the paragraphs of these terms operates separately. If any court or relevant authority decides that any of them are unlawful, the remaining paragraphs will remain in full force and effect.

If we do not insist immediately that you do anything you are required to do under these terms, or if we delay in taking steps against you in respect of your breaking this contract, that will not mean that you do not have to do those things and it will not prevent us taking steps against you at a later date.

20. Which law applies

These terms are governed by the laws of England and Wales and any disputes shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English courts.

21. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time, including to reflect changes to our practices or for other operational, legal, or regulatory reasons. If a change would materially affect you, we will tell you at least 30 days before it takes effect and you can end your contract with us and receive a refund for anything you have paid for but not received.